sketches - December 2309

It's been too long since my last Christmas card, so I had to get some inspiration. My original idea was not panning out due to complexity - I wanted to do a kid cooking Christmas dinner and making a huge mess of the stove top, while trying to read a cook book on a music stand. I can see it in my head and needed to do some research for reference images, but ran out of time, so I'm resorting back to what I feel comfortable doing on such short notice - goofy kids, which I have a lot of fun drawing. We should come up with a children's book - any ideas, people!!! Hint, hint. Maybe I'll try something grander for a Christmas card next year.

This has been one hell of a year, as most of you may know. The tally comes to four people's parents that have past away, one thinking she had cancer, one moving away, two nearly died, lost one as a friend, close co-workers quitting to go to another company, shitty situation at work, depression. On the other hand, gained some new friends, got closer to others, a lot of self reflection and very thankful for all the good friends that I have and that everyone is in good health.

So quite a year, but nothing compared to what Leaded's gone through, going through. My thoughts are with you mank! I hope next year will be better for everyone, I really do. I'm keeping my fingers, toes and what ever else I can cross, crossed, as well as many other superstitious things, less the sacrificing of a living animal...or person?...too much, never mind. We are, after all, living in the twenty-first century where that does not occur, right? Somehow, I doubt that, we just call it war:p

sketches - December 1809

Had the strangest dream last night.

I was in a large warehouse size toy store, and helping Batman fight the Joker and his side kick little girl. There was this large bin of brightly colored, super soaker looking airsoft guns that shot a hundred BBs at once, and I was racking them off at the Joker behind cover. The little girl was pretty mean with cans of silly string as lines of it shot my way. It was a long night of Batman and me chasing them back and forth and I can't remember the rest, because the dream took on another path.

sketches - December 0609

Mine Got! What is this?!?! Another blog entry this soon?

I guess I must try and keep this shit up to save face. I got you guys into this and I failed to keep up. But it's just been one hell of a couple of years. Can't wait for it to be over!

So the classmate friend called me up earlier this week. We had not talked in many months. Life got busy for everyone. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!!! Anyway, he wanted to see if I would be interested in going painting Saturday afternoon, and I said yes, otherwise I would never go out painting by myself. And so we went across the bay, North of Alameda, next to a port for container ships. By this time it was already after one, so there isn't a lot of light left, maybe two or three hours before the light just changes too fast to paint.

I have not painted in so long, that I had no confidence in myself to paint anything decent - I'm just not a very fast painter, so by the end, the painting kinda changed with the sunlight. But I don't know, I kinda like it.

sketches - November 2709

OMG, I am SO getting Final Fantasy XIII!!! And I hope that it is going to be good. Because if it is reviewed well. Then I will have to get it. And when I do get it, I might just retreat to the "man cave", and immerse myself in another epic late night, no sleep, anti-social behavioral, nerdy glee of casting freakin bad ass spell affects, and can't get enough of, RGP!

Behold the holy cheesy story, and then the game play, heh, heh

http://ve3d.ign.com/videos/58849/Xbox-360/Final-Fantasy-XIII/Trailer/Japanese-Launch-Trailer

sketches - November 1809

So ends an era that is my work at EA.

I remember the golden days of working at EA back in 2001. It was hard times for me around that time. I had just took a risk and jumped jobs to go with a friend I met at PCPL, sold to THQ. He quit and went to Midway Games. I was all excited and wanted to do something really fun - a third person shooter remake of Area 51! I mean, hell yeah! That could have been lots of fun, except for 9/11. Shortly after that the studio got shut down, and I was out on my ass.

I was on unemployment for a little while until that same friend that I jumped jobs for got me an interview with EA. Oh yes, the "dreaded" EA where they "work your ass off and then throw you away when they're done with you" reputation. But what could I do. The bills gota be paid, so I went and interview. Next comes the "TFT" contract, where they screw you by saying that you are considered a "full time" employee, but with no benefits. Meaning that you are considered a "salaried" employee, and not an "hourly" one, so you are not bound to the "forty hour week" max rule. Instead, you work overtime and not get paid for it. Nice one. I was stuck. What can I do? Bills had to be paid. The three month contract got extended twice. When it was up, then, they gave me a full time offer. Gee, thanks. I was stuck. What can I do? Bills had to be paid - off to the dungeons I go.

The first project was "Freakstyle". This was a SSX meets Motocross type game, and it was actually pretty fun to work on. The project was a co-dev with Page 44 Studios. Well, color my ass impressed. This freakin corporation's got some nice shit. I was set up with everything I need for production. I was quickly set up with a personal TV hooked up to a PS2 test station that's connected to the workstation. Holy Crap! No more sharing of one test station to every four or five artist! I got a lot of work done! No benefits, still sucked ass.

I was put on the second project right after the first one with no breaks. I was to help out on Bond, Nightfire, building track environments. That was pretty challenging, and I had lots of fun as well. They say that the "third" one's the charm - I guess it was for me, because I was put on the next Bond game: James Bond - Everything or Nothing, "EON" for short. To my luck, I was put on as the only artist on Multi-player. The Art Directed didn't care about the look of it, so I had free reign, baby!!! I did almost everything that had to do with the environments, from concepting, to modeling, to texturing, and even lighting and props - awesome!!! That was my "Golden Era" at EA.

It all went down hill from there.

I just didn't understand how they could take apart an awesome team like EON, where everyone worked well together and can totally make another game just as fast and efficiently. After EON, I was pretty mush a firefighter. I guess they figured that If I was good enough to do everything in a fast and efficient manner, that I could do a lot for projects that are in danger of not making ship date, and so, I that's what I became year after year following crunch after crunch. But what can I do. I was stuck. Bills had to be paid. I dub that time the Dust Bunny Era......

The last era is be Dead Space. This project was indeed challenging, but the challenges didn't come without great sacrifice. What started out as an attempt to be closer to the other half on the other side of the world, didn't quite work out. The job was much more demanding than expected, and what was supposed to be a three month training tour turned out to be eight. By the end, I not only saw very little of the other half, but also blew a major fuse in the noggin as well. But not all was a lost, there I have met and made some good friends. I guess I kinda fell in love with the people on team that I trained and that was totally worth it. The studio was full of eager people who are eager to learn new things and they totally reminded me of me when I first started in the industry - I got swept up by their energies and could not leave them stranded when the tidal wave of work came. They were not ready.

Take us to January 2009, the start of a sequel. This time around it was going to be "different", so we thought. The art team was now armed with the knowledge of all the mistakes and successes that was made on the first one. We made sure we gave tests to potential vendors that we thought would be a good fit. The test was on two areas of production; the artist side as well as the technical side - both are needed for a successful outsourced pipeline. There were four vendors in all that was tested, EASH was one of them. Needless to say that I was proud of the results! EASH was top runner on both counts! So we had a good start, but to make a long story short, the process that the art team came up with to solve the outsourcing issues, were never taken seriously, and so, we are still struggling with getting things organized enough and prepared enough before given the work to our outsourcing co-developers. It has already been twelve months of this BS. I am done! So when the ex-GM and COO left and formed a new company, and a lot of people left with them, including a good co-worker friend, the "writing" was on the Wall. It was time to pump up the ball and bounce... But before I bounce away, I felt that I needed to do what ever I can to help out the team that I had trained. They were good, but still had management problems, so I asked to go for a two week training of the team, because there were a lot of newer artist that I have not met before. I needed to assess the problem and make suggestions and additional training as best as I could. It was sad to know that I may not work with any of them ever again. But hey, what can I do? My mind was fried, my spirits are low, I haven't created content in over three years, and the fun meter here has hit rock bottom - why on earth do they give management responsibilities to artist like me makes absolutely no sense. I need to make the best game art, ever, and that's just not possible for me at EA anymore. I need something more.

In my attempt to bounce a little early, I offer myself as one of the 1,500 "sacrificial lambs" for the upcoming sacrifice to the unemployment Gods. This seems to have become an annual ritual performed in order to appease the corporate bottom line, but no go.

And so, here I sit...tick, tock....

I feel sad for leaving EA, I had some great times and met some good people.

sketches - October 0109

Wow, it has been a while since my last entry. I've just been too burned out and had no motivation or inspiration or energy to update. This year has been a bitch. I'm hoping that next year will be better for everyone.

Happy holloween!

sketches - July 0609

July 4Th was one of those days...

One of those totally awesome days! Yeah! Seemed like all the planets aligned, well, almost anyway. The day started out with waking up around 9:30am. The sun was bright and the sky was totally clear. The Warden was in town so we decided to have a late planned/impromptu BBQ. As expected, with this late of a notice, brought up the night before, not a lot of people showed. But that's ok, less to cook;) The original plan was to do some BBQ'n and then hit the range, but because BBQ'n takes a lot of time and by the time we would have been done eating and cleaning up, we would have miss the window for the range visit. They close at 4pm. So, we decided to do the opposite, and everything worked out perfect.

We hit the range and was also accompanied by Rave Boy and GF. The Warden had brought down the Kimber as well as his 38, SIG and TRP. We got two lanes and while I started hitting the targets in front of me, The Warden was instructing Rave Boy and GF in the second lane. My aim was not as true this time as it was the last, but didn't do too bad either. Got all shots on the target sheet and even three of ten shots in the 20 ring, at twenty five yards! Not too bad for me:) Rave Boy and GF didn't do too badly either, and both seemed to have had fun. All in all, range day was a success. Next comes the BBQ'n

As for who did, or did not show? The Professor was not going to make it because he had chores to do at home, but he did show up just a an hour or so before everything was cleaned up. He had some food and chatted. The Acupuncturist could not make it due to previous plans, so did not show. The only ones left and did show were Rave Boy and GF. As for the BBQ itself, everything rolled like clockwork. Even though we were in no rush, we didn't seem to stop at any one moment, thinking that there's nothing to do - everything seemed to have flowed like water. Awesome!

The Warden prepared chicken Adobo, stuffed mushrooms, and Portabella mushrooms with ground beef.

I started up the BBQ and cooked two filly's, two tri-tips, hot Italian sausages, and sliced red and green bell peppers, as well as the rice - all the while sipping on twelve year old Scotch;)

After the great food, and some chatting, I began the clean-up effort. Clean-up went just as smooth as butter. The Professor left for his home and we all agreed to meet at his place for some pyrotechnic fun - burning things!

And thus ends a perfect day:)